Page 38 of Extreme Romancing in Idaho

I angled my head to get a better look at my blade. Sure enough, the leather cover was securely snapped into place. Heat burned from the base of my neck and into my cheeks. I yanked the sheathing off, marched it to the table, then stepped back in place. The wood handle grew warm in my sweaty palm. Without thinking or overanalyzing, I swung my arm back, closed my eyes, and let go.

A clank and a thud, like a blade sinking into the wood, echoed in the lane.

“Ahh!Ye-ah!”

I couldn’t tell if Remi’s exclamations were good or bad. Maybe I’d hit the target and shocked him.

Opening my eyes, I examined the boards and the floor in front of them but couldn’t find where it’d landed.

“You almost hit me.” Remi breathed hard.

I cringed and turned around, but still couldn’t find it. I met Remi’s gaze as his expression changed from startled to all-out laughter. He backed up, leaned on the counter-height table, and pointed up at the ceiling.

Grimacing, I peered upward, and there, stuck in the beam above my head, was my axe.

Remi wiped his eyes. “I’ll pay you a thousand dollars if you can do that again.”

Thankfully, we’d come early enough that only two other lanes were being used. The teenager at the counter tipped his head in my direction. Would they kick me out for hitting the beam above my lane?

“Stop laughing.” I glared at Remi. “Quick. Help me get it down before anyone sees.”

“It’s too late for that.”

Sure enough, the other four people in the lanes across from us pointed and whispered to each other. I jumped and tried grabbing the handle but missed and wobbled on my wedges once I hit the ground.

“Hold on.” Remi chuckled and dragged a stool over to me.

He went to climb onto it, but I pushed him out of the way. I could get my own axe. Daniel would be here in less than an hour, and I hadn’t even managed to throw the thing in the right direction.

I was doomed. Standing on my tippy toes on the stool to reach the handle, I yanked on it and tugged it in all directions. It didn’t budge. Putting all my weight into it, I flexed my arms and heaved. Both of my feet lifted off the stool, which teetered and fell, leaving me dangling for a split second. All at once, the axe slid free—a scream squeaked from me as I plummeted toward the floor with a sharp blade clutched in my hands.

This is how I’m going to die …Angelina Johnson, the axe, on the concrete floor.

My journey to guaranteed pain ended almost as soon as it had begun, but instead of impacting concrete, Remi’s sturdy arms wrapped around me, clutching me to his chest. The weight of the axe propelled my arms downward, and the shiny, lethal metal barely missed my temple and Remi’s thigh. The wooden handle jerked against my grip.

Sounds of blood rushing through my ears quieted the calls of concern from the other patrons. The space between my face and Remi’s was less than a thin slice of sandwich bread—

the cheap kind we ate during harvest.

His eyes met mine, and for an infinitesimal moment, his gaze warmed and touched my lips. Holy mother of pearl! I wanted to close the bread-width gap and mack on him, but my mind clung to Daniel and the future I’d built up in fantasy land with him.

Numbing tingles radiated into the tips of my fingers. I lost my grip on the axe. Remi’s lips pinched together, a sheen coming over his eyes like he was about to cry.

Then he dropped me.

My backside hit the cold, unforgiving ground. A shockwave from the impact jolted through my spine. “Oof.” I glared at Remi. How dare he drop me?

But he wasn’t looking at me. He hobbled on one foot, rubbing the toes on the other. “Ow. That hurt. Ow. Ow. Ow,” he repeated over and over. “Did you have to drop the butt end of your axe on my toe?”

He put his foot down and limped back and forth in our lane while I struggled to a standing position. I tugged my shirt and skirt into place and retrieved my axe.

“So, you dropped me?” Some hero he’d turn out to be. A little hit to his toe and the damsel would be plummeting down a cliff to her death.

“It hurts.”

“And now, thanks to you, my butt will have a bruise the size of the Snake River Canyon on it.”

But I knew it could have been much worse. Images of a compound fracture of my radius and ulna—the scan of my cracked skull—a gash on my head to match the one I already had—flashed through my mind. I was a blasted nurse. Pulling stunts like this was how trauma happened.

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